SWALK
by auditoryeden
Summary: He's sent her flowers, and not just a grocery-store bouquet or the sort of flowers a florist might call "emergency level one". These flowers are at least emergency level five, possibly even emergency level "I-cheated-on-you-with-a-teenage-hooker".


Okay, but seriously.

He's sent her flowers, and not just a grocery-store bouquet or the sort of flowers a florist might call "emergency level one". These flowers are at least emergency level five, possibly even emergency level "I-cheated-on-you-with-a-teenage-hooker", except of course he hasn't. Among other reasons, he's been struggling to get his candidate off the ground, with no time to have been soliciting baby prostitutes.

Josh Lyman, a man who has not spoken to her in two months, bought those flowers because he wanted to.

He also sent a card with them, a card that says "Happy Anniversary" on the front in swirling blue type, and again in his handwriting inside. Donna's desk is the envy of the Russell campaign office, and everyone's buzzing about who her man is, this guy who evidently really understands how an anniversary is meant to be honored. Even the cardboard cutouts seem to be grinning suggestively in her direction today.

Will swings by her desk early in the day, and his eyebrows shoot up as he catches sight of the flowers. "Wow," he says. "DEFCON one?"

"Excuse me?"

"Whoever sent you those," he clarifies, "Did something pretty bad?"

Donna stares at him balefully, thanking god he somehow missed last year's edition of the annual circus Josh inevitably throws for their "anniversary". "Nope," she says. "Just a man of occasion."

* * *

"Okay," Will says, two months later, sounding a little sad and jealous, "How many anniversaries can you possibly have with this man?"

It's another stunningly beautiful arrangement (DEFCON one, as Will has dubbed it) with the same card that he'd sent in February, except now it's April and Donna is mildly furious with him. "A few," she answers, mysteriously, and Will shrugs and walks away.

* * *

On June second, the next in a long and unevenly timed line of bouquets arrives at Russell headquarters California, this time with a small wrapped box that opens to contain a pair of beautiful but eminently practical earrings, a minute cloud of gold loops with a single small crystal nestled in the center of each stud, the kinds of things she can wear to work every day and feel grown-up and special in. She wants to scream when she sees them, wants to march over to the Santos campaign office, wherever it may be, and demand to know if he is completely out of his mind, because even when they were still friends he had never bought her jewelry, and back when the world still made sense, serious flowers only once a year.

Her first assumption, when the February anniversary bouquet had landed, had been that Josh was laying on the guilt, saying, effectively, _Hey look, you bailed on me, without notice, but clearly I'm the bigger person so here's a token of how I was totally the best boss ever, remember me and weep_. Her better angels had suggested mildly that possibly he was apologizing, sending a peace offering, but the larger part of her had clung deliberately to the theory of cocky, inconsiderate, manipulative Josh.

Every subsequent installment has challenged that notion, challenged Donna to plumb the depths of her Josh-related knowledge and determine his motive. Josh isn't precisely conscientious but he doesn't waste money on things, not even useless and mean-spirited flowers with which to needle his former assistant. Josh also doesn't buy women jewelry. He buys them books, Donna knows, he buys them coffee mugs and bumper stickers and trips to Tahiti, at least in theory, but he's never once spent money at a jeweler in all the time she's known him, and as the maven of his receipts she'd been in a position to know. Once she'd asked him why, in the throes of a discussion of Amy's birthday present, and he'd sensibly argued that he'd never seen the point point in buying something so expensive when he and everyone knew there was no chance he'd pick something she'd like.

This statement of policy had been accepted at face value at the time, but confronted with his impromptu offering Donna can't help but feel confused, and not a little annoyed.

Moreso because, well, she does like them. They are exactly the kind of thing she wants to wear every day, and for that reason, the box is buried in her ever-packed suitcase and ignored.

* * *

Over the course of six months, he sends her flowers twenty-three times. Not all of them are the stunning siblings of the February anniversary, many more modest, but nonetheless, twenty-three bouquets delivered to her desk in whatever's passing for headquarters wherever they are.

It's not just Russell staffers wondering now.

She's also fielded questions from reporters, senators and their aides, hotel staff, and on two hair-raising occasions, Santos staffers, those last frequently addressed while the man himself was within shouting distance.

She has not fielded questions from any White House staffer, even though she's pretty sure the assistants and CJ at least are all aware of Josh's floral offerings. Any one of them would be easily able to clear up the mystery of Donna Moss's speculative boyfriend if asked, so Donna has to thank God every day that no one has.

* * *

"Hey, Josh!" Will calls to the conference room where the Santos people have set up their computers, from the room across the hall where Team Russell has made camp. It's an unusual setup, but this close to the convention, things are starting to get crazy.

"Yeah?" Josh is perched on the edge of the table near the door, with a folder in his hands, in the clothes he's been wearing for forty-eight hours, looking haggard.

"Do you know who's been sending Donna flowers?" Will asks, pretty much at top volume, just in time for Donna herself to hear as she turns the corner from the elevators.

As she looks on, horrified, Josh watches his counterpart blankly for a long moment. "Yeah," he says. "Why?"

Will cocks his head a little to the side, makes his way to the doorway of his own conference room. "You do?"

"Yeah," Josh repeats, distinctly unfriendly. "Why?"

"Not a word, Joshua!" Donna interrupts, in a flood of panicked adrenaline, rushing down the hall.

"Oh, hey. You've got another one," Will informs her, motioning behind himself. "It's on the table. He's at DEFCON four, I'd say. Just a little token of affection."

"Ah, glad to hear it," Donna quips sarcastically. "Josh, come with me, please."

"I got stuff to do," he denies, humorlessly, glancing between her and Will.

"Now, Joshua."

"Yes, ma'am." He closes his folder with an insouciant snap and lays it on the table. "Lead the way."

Donna inhales sharply through her nose, praying for patience, and makes a beeline for the small, windowless room with the printer in it, not looking to see whether Josh is following.

He obliges her by closing the door behind them, and settling against it.

"You sent me earrings," she accuses him as she turns, voice low. "For no reason whatsoever, you sent me jewelry."

His smile is crooked and unhappy looking. "Do you have a point?"

"You don't do that, Josh! You don't get to do that and then not explain yourself!" Her voice grows higher and more frantic with every passing word.

"Explain myself?" he repeats, terribly blank-faced. "What's to—"

"Joshua!" Donna cuts him off like a whip crack. "Are you trying to undermine me?"

The neutrality drops from his expression in an instant. "No!" he insists. "Why would I be—"

"Because you hate Russell and you hate that I work for him," she accuses, bitter, "and you hate that I left you to go work for him. You hate that I'm not under your thumb anymore."

"Is that really what you think of me?" he demands, pushing off the door and getting right into her personal space. "That's why you think I'm upset? Cause you went to work for Bingo Bob? How about, cause you bailed on me right when I needed you most. How about, cause you didn't give me any warning. How about, cause you walked out of my life, and despite the fact that I'm _furious_ with you, I still miss you every goddamn day."

A long moment passes where they're both breathing hard, staring straight into each others' eyes, locked, and then Josh speaks, voice breaking. "Dammit, Donna."

And then he's kissing her.

He captures her mouth with a tilt of his head, one of his voluble, expressive hands cupping her jaw and the other landing on her hip, drawing her into his body even as he steps closer, surrounding and imposing with all of his considerable physical presence. Some men kiss with their lips alone, but Josh, Josh kisses with his whole body. His shoulders are rising and falling with each breath, his hips press against hers, faintly suggestive, every inch of him screams passion and restraint in equal measure, and the butterfly wings of his fingertips flutter against her cheek, her throat, her chin. He dives deeper, and Donna opens her mouth to him in a rush of hot air, whimpering as his tongue darts against her lip, as he draws back for a moment only to kiss her more deeply still.

Their kisses are slow and insistent and aching with apprehension, every movement glacial, as Josh thrusts against her, as she curls around him and into him, pushes herself against him like a needy cat. The careful balancing act of their professional relationship had been obliterated when Donna threw down her words in the bullpen, but now they're burning the script. Each press of lips and tongues and hands is new and different and each one feels like the last they'll share, so they have to keep going, they have to make one more, because if they stop they'll break apart forever.

Slowly, he backs her into the desk, guides her onto it. It seems like the easiest thing in the world for Donna to open her legs, twine a calf around the back of his thigh, and then they're pressed intimately together, four layers of fabric unable to disguise his arousal or her heat.

Together, they break apart, foreheads resting gently together, a quiet groan shared between them.

Donna opens her eyes to him, finds him staring at her from under heavy lids, mouth open, expression muddied with desire. Her hands move to his face, touch his stubborn jaw, and he takes her hips in his, palms and fingers gripping and spreading, before he rocks into her, deliberate, watchful.

Her breath jolts painfully in her chest at the feeling.

Josh holds her gaze unblinkingly, hypnotically, as he thrusts again, pulling her hips closer, grinding against her with a tightening jaw and stuttering breath. It feels, for Donna, like she's expanding, her skin too tight and her breath too shallow, the hot, twitching pleasure between her legs simultaneously too much and too little. She can feel him, hard, feel the ridge of him nudging into her, as he deliberately imitates the rhythms of sex, hips and back and buttocks flexing against her.

It feels too intimate.

She's tried not to dedicate too much thought to the idea of sex with Josh, but there's only so much she can do to police herself, and she's always, always wondered if it would feel strange to see him naked.

For so much of their relationship, he's been fully covered, her only knowledge of his skin drawn from his face and neck, his hands and wrists. His forearms have been a rare and cherished treat, the occasional inch or two of chest exposed by an unbuttoned collar unwitting fuel for hours of distracted wonderings. Donna knows what a naked man looks like, can, academically, posit what Josh looks like under his well-fitted trouser and badly wrinkled shirts, but she can't quite picture him nude, aroused, in her bed, as though Josh, clothed, and Josh, unclothed, are two completely different men. In early morning fantasies of Josh making love to her, moving inside her, her visual imagination usually limits itself to his face and hands, all the rest an indistinct blur of movement and yearning.

There's always a vulnerability to undressing for someone, a sort of phase shift, a sense that the relationship is changing, that a different path is being taken. When it's abrupt, a sudden shift, it can feel almost like getting naked turns them into a whole other person, and once the clothes are picked up and put on, they revert back, the intermediary sexual partner effectively lost. Still dressed, what Josh is doing now forces this sexual, passionate baggage into the context of the same Josh-and-Donna who walked the White House halls, the same Josh-and-Donna who bickered over coffee and Christmas presents, the same people who waltzed around one another in ballrooms and meetings, best friends, pit bull and handler, boss and assistant, most recently bitterly estranged acquaintances. There's no chance for her to slip into the accepting head space where Josh could be anyone, any man with beautiful shoulders and a hard cock. Just her, and him, and the sense that they're straining against the weight of their history with every tightening, shuddering thrust.

His jaw grits, her only warning before he's jolting against her sharply, once, twice, thrice—

She tries to stop it, but she lets out a high, keening sound as her body starts to convulse, her mind starts to white out, her orgasm rips through her.

It's all she can do to pant through it, and as the tide ebbs, sink against his solid, warm shoulder. Minutes pass while she breathes, exhausted and exhilarated, making no effort to think or speak or do anything at all besides feel the aftershocks and Josh's heartbeat under her cheek. Clarity begins to return eventually, along with the fact that, yes, she is sitting on the desk in the public workspace of a Hampton Inn, in a harshly lit corporate jail cell essentially, and outside the door both their staffs are working tirelessly to choose the next president, and she's just dry humped her old boss like a teenager.

Clarity, and the fact that, between her legs, she can feel that he's still hard.

Her first attempts to sit up are foiled by the weakness in her arms. Josh catches her elbows, helps her lever herself off of him, and she sees in his face, in his tight jaw and bright eyes, how wound up he is, how badly he wants her.

Gently, she puts one hand, then the other, on his chest, and pushes him away.

The look on his face is instantly stricken, an expression of loss and bewilderment, but Donna doesn't let it sway her; he doesn't know what she's up to, yet. The pressure on his chest encourages him to step back once, twice.

A few steps later she follows him, sliding off the desk, and when her legs wobble she lets them, lets herself fall onto her knees before him, hands lighting on his hips. He gasps, the sound loud even against the faint, ambient chaos of two campaign offices beyond the door. Not so stricken anymore, more nervous, excited. The shape of him is visible through his jeans, and Donna has to swallow against a rush of sudden, eddying desire.

She's always liked giving oral sex.

In college her girlfriends had mostly decried it, testifying that, although they would do it to make their guys happy, the actual act didn't do much for them, with reactions ranging from vague tolerance to begrudging disgust. Donna had always nodded along, giggled at her friends' horror stories, and allowed them to praise her bravery when she once admitted to swallowing.

It hadn't really seemed like the kind of thing she was supposed to like, at the time. Now she understands it a little better, understands the heady rush from taking a man apart and making him moan, understands the kind of feedback loop of positive emotion, understands that she likes to hold him when he's come undone, that she has a raw, fundamental appreciation for a man's anatomy. Many a woman has said that giving a blowjob is putting herself in a man's power, but for Donna, it's always felt the other way around; when she takes a man in her mouth, she's got the power.

And even without that, she just really likes it.

She keeps eye contact steady with him as she pops the button on his jeans, lowers the fly, even through the first tentative strokes over his boxers, Josh visibly struggling to keep his cool and her own heart racing from the very _idea_ of Josh's cock, hard in her hands. When she finds the waistband, though, and starts working his erection free, she has to look. It's involuntary, instinctual. The sight of him, flushed red and ready, sets her stomach fluttering again.

He's gloriously hot against her palms.

Josh takes another huge, ragged breath as she begins to stroke, squeezing gently as she draws her hand up the shaft of him, and she gives him her best, most winning smile. He still looks stunned, but that's nothing to the way his face collapses as she leans forward and kisses the tip of him.

The low, nearly anguished groan he lets out as she opens her mouth and sucks him in is the kind of sound that she knows she'll be dreaming about for months. It's probably just as well he's so far gone, she thinks, since she's pretty sure they haven't got long before Will knocks or calls a search party. Fast and dirty's not her favorite, but desperate times call for desperate measures, and with a final glance up at Josh's closed eyes and pained expression, Donna sets herself to her task.

He takes barely two minutes to bring to a panting, jolting, utterly devastating groan of " _Shit, Donna—_ " and then he's hissing as his stomach tightens and he comes in her mouth.

Her heart is still racing as she draws back, swallowing and licking her lips, eyes cast up to his again. His are slitted open, watching her with an expression somewhere between rapture and blank panic, and she realizes suddenly that his hands are clenched by his sides, have been the whole time, not wound in her hair or resting on her shoulders, but fisted, restrained.

He swallows, gulps really, as she rises, fumbles to tuck himself back into his pants, looks at her like he has no idea what to do or say.

Which doesn't stop him from finding his tongue. "You didn't have to…do that."

"I wanted to." If Donna had ever needed proof for her theory of oral sex power dynamics, this would be it. He's nervous and quiet and unsure, and she's assured and buzzing and not a little bit proud. Her voice is steadier than his, and she licks her bottom lip again as a smile breaks over her face. "I liked it."

"Oh." Josh's voice is higher, a little strained. "Well. Good. Me, too."

"Good." His shirt's not lying quite right anymore, disturbed by their various activities, and Donna busies herself with straightening it, making sure she hasn't crushed his collar, and then on second thought, she smooths his hair, which is standing characteristically on end.

"What did you mean," he breaks in, reaching up to take her wrists in his hands. "Earlier, you asked me if I was trying to undermine you. What did you mean?"

It takes maybe longer than it should for her to remember, remember that this whole, universe-altering thing had begun when she hauled him into this room to upbraid him for sending her flowers and presents that had made her an object of universal speculation. Once she recalls that, it takes a moment more to marshal her arguments. "I thought...I thought maybe you were sending things so that I couldn't forget you. To try to remind me of what...To make me feel...I don't know, it sounds stupid now I'm trying to say it out loud."

"Well," he sighs. "I mean, yeah, I was trying to remind you of me. Of me when you liked me, if you ever did. And maybe...to apologize."

"For what?" It's clear to both of them that by this she doesn't mean to imply he has nothing to apologize for.

He heaves a sigh through his nose, reaches out to touch her cheek. "For making you feel like you weren't appreciated," he admits. "You were. You remember what I wrote, our second Christmas?"

"In _The Art and Artistry of Alpine Skiing_?" Confusion colors Donna's voice. "Yeah."

"I still mean it."

He's giving her that look of his, the slightly sheepish, tender one with the raised brows and the wide eyes, and it takes her straight back to that moment when she'd read the words she'd cherished through a hundred late nights, a hundred unbearable days since. When he'd leaned against the doorframe and smiled like a kid, begged her uselessly not to cry.

That had been one of the first times she'd admitted to herself that she loved him, in any capacity.

"You have to stop sending flowers, Josh," she tells him softly, working hard not to let the faint welling of tears fall. "Someone's going to ask too many questions. It would look bad for the campaign if—"

"Donna," he interrupts, taking her shoulders. "I'll stop."

"Good," she agrees.

A rueful little smile breaks out on his face. "Mostly," he amends. "I reserve the right to send you flowers in February until I die."

"Less expensive ones," she haggles, eyes snapping. He actually laughs a little at that, and shakes his head. "If I'm only allowed to send them once a year, they're gonna be nice."

"Joshua," she admonishes him, and it only makes him grin. The brightness of his smile takes years off him, makes him look almost as young as he had that first day in the campaign office, when his face was still mobile and his hairline hadn't receded yet. Her heart almost misses a beat at the sight of it.

"Donnatella, I can afford to send you nice flowers for our anniversary," he tells her, and she gets the sense that she's forgiven. Full names have always been used by way of pet names between them, a simple, discreet verbal signal of intimacy and affection, even when one or the other was invoking them by way of a rebuke. Since she quit, she's been _Donna_ or worse still, _Donna Moss_ , on all occasions when he's had to address her. _Donnatella_ is a sound for sore ears.

The quick staccato rap of knuckles on the door is not.

"Donna," Will calls out, sounding as usual somewhere between cautious and sarcastic. "If you're done scolding him, I need you for a meeting."

"I'll be there in a minute," she calls back, and then she's taking Josh's head in her hands and pulling him down into another searing kiss. "We need to talk," she tells him, quietly. "Can you come to my room tonight?"

"We're taking off tomorrow morning," he warns. "But yeah. I'll be there."

"Nine o clock," she suggests, and he nods, accepts the spare key she digs hurriedly out of her wallet, smiling still but with the tightness creeping in around his eyes. "You should scowl some more," she says, mostly joking. "Don't want anyone to get the wrong idea."

That's enough to raise an eyebrow, and he keeps it raised as she opens the door, discovering as she does so that it has been unlocked for the duration of their activities.

"The wrong idea," he says, speaking against her ear, as Will comes into view. "Uh huh."

It's remotely possible, Donna thinks, watching him brush past her and swagger away to his troops, that the lingering, obvious caress of her waist wasn't intentional, but meeting Will's eyes, observing the vague panic in his face as he darts his gaze between her and Josh's back, she's pretty sure it was. One of Josh's unfailing talents has always been driving away other men who like her.

Will falls into step with her as she makes for their conference room, glancing back with furrowed brows. "So, uh, those flowers," he says, sounding squeamish. "How did he know where to send them?"

There's a lot in that question that doesn't bear dignification by response, and Donna has bigger things to contemplate. Polling numbers, how she's going to spin the VP candidate, and the key card in Josh's back pocket.

Maybe, Donna thinks, if she's exceptionally lucky, she'll have time to dig out the earrings before nine o'clock.


End file.
